Delivery of Wool and First Place ribbon.

This is what my car looks like when I drop off the wool. Yikes. Thank goodness its not heavy.

Here we see Las Rancheritas in front of the donated wool. Note the first place ribbon on Bonifacias blouse. They are so grateful for the beautiful wool. The

 quality of the rugs has greatly improved because of this beautiful wool some of it even hand dyed.

Petra Grande is always up for fun so she jumped into the wool.

They prepared a potluck as their way of thanking me, and any friends I bring along, for bringing the wool. Since this is the season for nopal cactus, in the USA it is called prickly pear, we had allot of nopal dishes: nopal cactus salad, nopal cactus stew, quesadillas stuffed with nopales and beans. Some of the extras were, spaghetti, fried potatoes patties, rice with mole sauce and of course piles of tortillas. And just to make things interesting there was a spicy dark red chili sauce. It was country feast.

To prepare nopals for eating you much first remove the spins, tricky work, not recommended for the inexperienced.

Nopal Salad

1. Take fresh pads of nopals and remove the spins, or buy them at the grocery store (but they won't be as fresh)
2. Slice the pads into strips.
3. Cook in boiling water for about 20 minutes
4. Drain well in a colandar at least 5 minutes. They have a slippery interior a bit like aloe and you are cooking and draining some of that off.
5. Place the cooked, drained strips in a bowl and add, chopped onions, cilantro, tomatoes, chopped jalapeno chilis, and salt.
Delicious. Nopals are an hightly nutricious vegetable with many additional properties like lowering cholesterol. 

King William Art Show

On Saturday, April 16, Susan White and I showed the rugs at the King William Art and Craft Show in San Antonio. This was a special honor since usually you must be the artist to exhibit your work. But do to the help of Rose  Kanusky and Max Martinez we were invited to participate since they understand the project and want to help rural Mexican communities. We sold 13 rugs most importantly Bonifacia's Wedding Rug!! And we won "Best of Show". Note the ribbon above our heads. I am thrilled.

Pictured: Rose, Charlotte, Susan.

From the show I drove to San Miguel were I am now nerviously waiting for 3:00 when I will give my yearly lecture on the "The Guide to Semana Santa" taken from my book about same. Tears from the Crown of Thorns.
Tomorrow is a big art craft show at the art school in San Miguel. Las Rancheritas will be exhibing there so I will bring them their money from San Antonio. On Sat I'll head out to the village to deliver the huge load of wool I have in my car, donations for all of you especially from the Yellow Rose Rug Camp. I'll take photos of the distribution and post them here.